About Eric

ERIC KIRSCH is a former Captain in the United States Marine Corps who served multiple combat deployments in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. Commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant after graduating with honors from The Citadel in 2004, Kirsch served in Iraq as Human Intelligence Exploitation Team (HET) Officer in Charge before being selected for further training at the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) Joint Counterintelligence Training Academy (JCITA), earning the title of Special Agent with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) in 2009. Since his honorable discharge in 2012, Kirsch has served as an Offensive Counterintelligence Operations instructor at JCITA; as a civilian Special Agent with NCIS; and as a civilian Advisor to the American Government and the Kurdish Regional Government in Iraqi Kurdistan. He is the founder and CEO of Torchlight USA.

This blog is record of our journey. I hope you enjoy!

~Eric

Lost Legion

Rome, the western half, both Republic and Empire existed between is founding 753 B.C.E until its long decay, decline, and eventual sacking led by East Germanic Military Prime Flavius Odoacer in AD 476.

A bronze then later a golden Eagle, or Aquila was the dominant most prized possession and battle standard of the Roman Legion. Legions were equipped with but one eagle and they were entrusted to care and bearing via one single Legionary, known as an Aquilifer. These sole man bearers were regarded as indomitable, subordinate only to the Emperor, and the Legatus Legionis, or Legion Commander, most often a sitting Senator appointed by the Emperor directly to serve at his pleasure.

The Eagle was the most precious inherent symbolic possession afforded to each individual legion, it was their sacred centerpiece of pride lust. The loss of this standard was considered irrecoverably abhorrent. Such was the loss of the Aquilia in battle occurring only nine times total in the 503 year existence of the Western Rome Empire. In 9 AD during the three day battle of Battle of the Teutoburg Forest, in modern day Germany, ALL THREE Legions, Legio XVII, Legio XVIII, and Legio XIX were summarily slaughtered and completely lost.

Nearly 21,000 Roman’s were killed by an exceptionally led, on familiar terrain, newly united Germanic tribes, all three Aquila’s were summarily lost to the victors. The pristine, priceless Roman treasures were now in the filthy hands of the Germanic Barbarian Horde, the horror, the horror.

The Germanic tribes during the battle were led by Arminius, son of Cheruscan Chief Segimerus. As a boy and teenager Arminius lived as a hostage in Rome and received a military education. He was provided a ROBUST education as a Roman Military Commander. Arminius obtained Roman citizenship and completed his training prior to returning to Germania then promptly lethally objurgating three entire Roman Legions via superior leadership and tactics. He then drove the remainder of all Romans garrisons from his region of Germania, permanently.

Emperor Augustus as referenced via the Roman historian Suetonius in “De vita Caesarum” or “On the Life of the Caesars”, upon hearing the news of the defeat was utterly devastated and repeatedly smashed his head into a marble wall until it bloodied while clutching written dispatches and uncontrollably screaming:

Publius Quinctilius Varus, the supreme commander of all three lost legions, or Legatus Augusti pro praetore, however had committed suicide upon realizing during the final minutes of the battle all three legions of his command had been completely destroyed. His body was decapitated post mortem by sword personally by the sneering, vindicated and utterly triumphant young open adrenal, hard and smart as fuck Germanic Commander Arminius, note: whom throughout his formative years… received a formal, exceptionally thorough Roman military education, in Rome, by Romans. This is important, do not train your potential enemies on the inner workings of your entire organization while treating them slightly better than actual slaves, it’s never… a good… idea.

A despondent Emperor Augustus, frantically commanded a pursuit, discovery, and recovery of the lost three Eagles. The first and second Eagles were recovered in 15 and 16 AD, the third and final Aquila repatriated nearly 50 years later in no small part to desperate, bloody, Roman restlessness of extraordinary logistics, ruthlessness, assassinations, and military complexity. No legionary Eagles remain in historical custody, all have dissolved into the abyss of history since the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD.

Since 1834, a feared, stoic, and notoriously elite separate branch and component of the United States Naval Service carries still and proudly continues the fierce tradition of the Aquila, representing 1/3 of their sacred symbol, the Eagle, Globe & Anchor.

-EGK.

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eric

Eric graduated with honors in 2004 from the The Citadel, the Military College of South Carolina, Charleston, SC, USA. He was then commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant, United States Marine Corps the same year, completed multiple combat deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan as a Counterintelligence / Human Source Intelligence Officer and later as a Case Officer and Active Duty Special Agent with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service. Eric honorably discharged as a Captain after 8 years’ service in 2012.

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About Eric

ERIC KIRSCH is a former Captain in the United States Marine Corps who served multiple combat deployments in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. Commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant after graduating with honors from The Citadel in 2004, Kirsch served in Iraq as Human Intelligence Exploitation Team (HET) Officer in Charge before being selected for further training at the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) Joint Counterintelligence Training Academy (JCITA), earning the title of Special Agent with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) in 2009. Since his honorable discharge in 2012, Kirsch has served as an Offensive Counterintelligence Operations instructor at JCITA; as a civilian Special Agent with NCIS; and as a civilian Advisor to the American Government and the Kurdish Regional Government in Iraqi Kurdistan. He is the founder and CEO of Torchlight USA.